~ – Where the magic starts –

Moonlight

“I wasn’t never worth shit. Never did anything I actually wanted to do, was all I could do to do what other folks thought I should do. I wasn’t never myself”

What is this movie about?

A timeless story of human self-discovery and connection, Moonlight chronicles the life of a young black man from childhood to adulthood as he struggles to find his place in the world while growing up in a rough neighborhood of Miami.

Why should you watch it?

This movie is a small jewel that everybody should watch. It is the story of a black boy growing up in a not so perfect environment and if his skin color wasn’t be enough he is also discovering his homosexuality.

The story is told in 3 parts, each part showing a different age of the main character. We see his childhood with school bullies. We see his adolescence with even more troubled bullies. We see his adulthood. Each part is admirably told in a fresh way that gets you hooked to the screen and wondering, wanting to keep watching how the story will unfold. The story is pretty simple but how it is viewed, with a direct, realistic point of view is what makes it perfect.

The three actors that play the main character at three different stages of his life are superb. Each of them have their style but within a whole. Then there is Naomi Harris. He portrayal of his mother is superb. Simply fantastic and real credible, as she has used to another kind of characters, but playing this one really shows that she can play whatever she puts her mind on. Simply brilliant. And then there is Mahershala Ali, who sadly doesn’t appear a lot in the film, but the tiny bit that he does, he just steals the just. Also fantastic.

If you are looking for a realistic portrayal of a real situation, please watch this movie. There is nothing out of the ordinary in it, and although you might not like the topic, it is good to see something different and what is more, a work superbly done.

Did you know?

– The film is based on the unproduced play “In Moonlight Black Boys Look Blue” by MacArthur Fellow Tarell Alvin McCraney.

– In an interview, Barry Jenkins said that the three actors who play Chiron never met during production. He wanted each of them to build their own persona of Chiron during their respective segments, with no influence from the other portrayals. The same technique was used with the actors who play Kevin.

– Naomie Harris had to shoot her entire role in three days, in between her promotional tour of Spectre (2015), due to a visa problem (Harris is British). The scenes spanned 15 years in the character’s life and were filmed out of sequence.

– The adult Chiron drives a car with the license plate number “BLACK305.” ‘Black’ is the nickname Kevin gives to Chiron when they are teenagers, and 305 is the area code for Miami.

– The second song that plays in the Diner is “Hello Stranger” by Barbara Lewis. Director Barry Jenkins made the decision to actually play the song on the jukebox in the background while they were filming.

– Filmed over 25 days in October and November 2015 in South Florida.

– When Juan teaches Little how to swim, Mahershala Ali is really teaching Alex R. Hibbert how to swim. When production started, Hibbert did not know how to swim.